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So, with MMO-champion’s latest PTR patch notes not listing any resto druid talent changes, I’m now posting the draft that I have for the 4.0.1 healing guide. I put in some talent links, but overall this is guide is very low on links because links always manage to change & break by patch day, and the forum version of the guide can’t have any embedded links at all.

I changed the guide, since you no longer need a page on Nourish or lifebloom anymore due to the changes to how the spells work, and this time I made really super generic link names so that I wouldn’t have to change them for future builds (since even the 4.0.3 build is likely going to have a different layout). There are still seven separate pages, with pages 1 & 2 talking about changes to our spells, page 3 talking about general healing advice, page 4 relates to talents, and the remaining pages talk about glyphs, gearing, gems, etc.

It is still in a fairly rough draft format (so there are still some things I need to finish), but I wanted to release the blog version before the forum version. Since you can’t post comments on the individual pages, please leave all feedback here (related to things I got wrong, typos, suggestions for improvements, etc). I’ll keep updating it as we get closer to release day.

When 4.0.1 hits, I will be taking down the 3.3 healing guide, and the old guide will simply contain links that direct you to the new guide’s location.

So, the moonkin-related changes for level 80 PvE aren’t quite as drastic as the resto druid changes. So, we shouldn’t really need to change out things like gems (unless you were using int gems, which weren’t good for moonkin before 4.0 anyway).

There are a few important gear changes you will need to be aware of for patch day:

You get a bonus for wearing leather armor that gives you additional int. Int is a very important stat, so you will want to wear all leather & no cloth. Buy badge gear replacements if you need to (even if they are slightly lower ilevel). This was something I worked on a couple weeks back, and really shouldn’t surprise anyone. This applies to resto druids, as well, but moonkin have historically worn more cloth (good bye featherkin, I’ll miss you!). If you have even 1 cloth piece equipped, you lose the 5% int from your leather specialization bonus.

Spirit no longer gives spell power, and now converts into hit rating through talents instead. I am pretty sure that I have insane amounts of hit rating (over the hit cap) on my level 80 beta druid. When reforging is introduced, you may need to convert spirit & hit into more useful stats once you’ve passed beyond the hit cap for your gear level. However, they may have also increased the amount of hit moonkin need (by up to 8% – Thanks Moonlyt) due to removing other hit rating from talents and such. My stats aren’t working right in beta to be able to test this, so I can’t verify what our new hit caps are.

You may need more haste. The cast time for wrath went up by half a second, and the new Nature’s Grace gives a 15% instead of 20% bonus when it is active. So, if you have too much hit, and you have a low haste rating (like me), then all that extra spirit on Spirit/Crit pieces should be converted into haste rating (you can’t convert into a stat already on the item, but there aren’t may spirit/haste pieces available).

Prime glyphs (You can have up to 3 equipped at any 1 time, but you can learn all of them in your spell book):

Insect swarm (increases IS damage by 30%) – With IS doing a lot of damage, this glyph is a “must have”

Moonfire (increases periodic moonfire damage by 20%) – this glyph is okay. You should pick it up before patch day to have it learned.

starfire (increases moonfire’s duration up to 9 sec) – this is still useful. I would pick it up. However, if we are spamming moonfire a lot, it may not turn out to be as good.

Starsurge (reduces cooldown of starfall) – Pick up glyph of nourish to turn into this (I already have it learned in my resto spec).

Wrath (increaes damage done by wrath 10% on targets with IS on them) – Slightly more useful than the old wrath glyph.

You can pick up glyph scrolls and hold onto them until patch day (where they may get more expensive for a while). After 4.0.1 is released, you only have to learn a glyph once and then it shows up in your glyph book forever. So, you can pick up glyphs even if they won’t be as useful to you in the future if you can get them at inexpensive prices before patch day. The above list is in alphabetical order, rather than in order of usefulness. I’m not 100% sure what will be the best glyph set for level 80. Right now, I think that Insect swarm and starfire should be strong contenders. For the third one, I’m not sure what comes out on top for level 80 (most of the glyph testing I’ve seen has been done for 85). Pick up all the glyphs related to your spec, because what ones we use or not could change over the course of even this week.

Major Glyphs (You can have up to 3 equipped at any 1 time, but you can learn all of them in your spell book)

Entangling Roots (roots are instant, but on a 10 sec cooldown) – This will be a great glyph at 85 and in PvP

Focus (reduces starfall’s range but increases damage) – This increases as a possibility of something we could use.

Hurricane (reduces movement speed) – Still not that useful, but you should pick up everything anyway.

Innervate (you get mana when you cast it on someone else) – you are balanced around using innervate on yourself in PvE now, so i’m not sure this glyph is worth it.

Rebirth (your target reses at full health & mana) – may actually be useful for PvE if you always have the problem (like me) where your target dies as soon as they get resurected. Rebirth has a 30 min cooldown now, so this may be worth it.

Starfall (reduces the cooldown of starfall by 30 sec) – this is still a must-have.

I would probably go for starfall, focus, and rebirth for level 80 raiding.

Minor (pick any 3) –

See the list for resto druids. You could pick up all of them if you want in your spell book.

Typhoon is the only glyph besides what I have listed for resto that you may want to pick up if you want to be able to remove the knockback in the future.

You should start stocking up on glyphs for the 4.0 patch and think about your gems, as well.

When 4.0 hits, you learn a glyph once, you never have to learn it again (you just swap it in & out of your spell book). So if you buy every glyph that survives into Cata (so long as it isn’t super expensive on your server), you can beat the 4.0 rush and not have to worry about glyphs (though I bet the glyph prices on some servers are already going up). Here’s the full glyph list from the data I’ve gathered so far.
For the below lists, I’m marking non-recommended glyphs with ** to indicate that they are optional to buy or not. In most cases, glyph decisions will be based on your healing style. Most “major” glyphs are marked with **, due to all being fairly situational for level 80. Any glyphs you have equipped at the time of transition will be added to your glyph book, except for glyphs being removed that don’t morph into another glyph. In my bags on beta, the Swift Rejuv glyph turned into useless vendor dust and was no longer a glyph at all (because that haste effect is going baseline). Keep in mind that any of these glyphs could be changed without notice.

Resto Glyphs to get for 4.0 that should be available before patch day:

Swiftmend (prime) – same & still useful

Rejuvenation (prime) – changed to be more useful

Lifebloom (prime) – changed to be more useful

**Regrowth (Prime) – changed to be less useful, but you can still add it to your spell book even if you don’t equip it.

For resto major glyphs, you really get to choose what will be the most helpful for you:

Wild Growth (major) – same & useful for raiding

**Rebirth (major) – Same, and becomes something I would get for my glyph selection to have available.

** Healing touch (major) – the effect was changed (will no longer turn HT into a flash heal). The new glyph is not necessarily super useful for level 80 raiding, but may be worth having.

** Innervate (major) – Will be more useful at 85.

** Roots (major) – Usefulness increased, and will be even more useful at 85, or if you PvP.

Minor glyphs:

Mark of the wild (minor) – reduces cost now that MotW is raid-wide without a reagent

Unburdened rebirth (Minor) – unchanged, and still useful

**Aquatic form (minor) -Increases swim speed by 50%

**Dash – (minor) reduces dash cooldown

Gems to pick up:

For red gem slots, Runed Cardinal Ruby turns into Brilliant Cardinal Ruby Spell power turns into int, because they are removing straight spell power from everything but weapons. Int will now give spell power in addition to it’s previous effects.

Keep in mind that anything with Int on it will likely become red instead of yellow. So, any yellow int you have in gem slots may potentially break your socket bonuses by turning into red gems (which puts luminous Ametrines at risk for becoming brilliant cardinal rubies or maybe something purple if one of the stats goes to spirit, and may turn some green gems with int into purple ones). Crit & haste are staying as yellow, so anything yellow will need to be crit or haste at this point if you care about socket bonuses.